xplaining to your "future father-in-law," as
I suppose you would not blush to call him, what an utterly
unreliable fellow you are and how in every way you have
disappointed

Your affectionate father,
JOHN HAZLEWOOD.

I shall arrive at two-thirty on the fifth (next Thursday). I wish
I could say I was looking forward to seeing this insane house of
yours.

There was something in the taste of marmalade very appropriate to an
unpleasant letter, and Guy wondered how many of them he had read at
breakfast to the accompaniment of the bitter savor and the sound of
crackling toast. He also wondered what was the real reason of his
father's coming. Was it curiosity, or the prospect of lecturing a
certain number of people gathered together to hear his opinion? Was it
with the hope of dissuasion, or was it merely because he had settled to
come on the fifth of September, and could not bear to thwart that
finicking passion of his for knowing what he was going to do a month
beforehand?

Anyhow, whatever the reason, he was coming, and the next problem was to
furnish for him a bedroom. How much had he in the bank? Four pounds
sixteen shillings, and there was a blank counterfoil which Guy vaguely
thought represented a cheque for two pounds. Of course Pauline's ring
had lowered his balance rather prematurely this quarter; he ought to be
very economical during the next one, and, as ill-luck would have it,
next quarter would have to provide fuel. Two pounds sixteen shillings
was not much to spend on furnishing a bedroom, even if the puny balance
were not needed for the current expenses of the three weeks to
Michaelmas. Could he borrow some bedroom furniture from the Rectory? No
doubt Mrs. Grey would be amused and delighted to lend all he wanted, but
it seemed rather an ignominious way of celebrating his engagement. Could
he sleep on the chest in the hall? And as it wabbled to his touch he
decided that not only could he not sleep on it nor in it, but that it
would not even serve as a receptacle for his clothes.

"Miss Peasey," he said, when the housekeeper came in to see if he had
finished breakfast, "my father is coming to stay here on Thursday."

Miss Peasey smiled encouragingly with the strained look in her eyes that
always showed when she was hoping to find out from his next sentence
what he had told her. Guy shouted his information over again, when, of
course, Miss Peasey pretended she had heard hi